Genesis 31-33

Day 24: Genesis 31-33 Notes & Takeaways

As we begin today’s reading in chapter 31 of Genesis, we see that Laban and his sons were extremely envious of Jacob’s wealth and success. The Lord had blessed all of his work and made him wealthier than Laban. Laban’s attitude turned sour towards Jacob and his heart was no longer the same. Envy and jealousy are detrimental to someone’s walk. It can change your heart for the worst. James 3:16 says, “For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.” See also 1 Cor 3:3.

Laban showed his selfishness in the way he cheated Jacob by changing his wages 10 times after tricking him into marrying Leah, then Rachel, and then constantly changing the color of sheep he could keep.

“So Jacob sent word to Rachel and Leah to come out to the fields where his flocks were. He said to them, “I see that your father’s attitude toward me is not what it was before,but the God of my father has been with me. You know that I’ve worked for your father with all my strength, yet your father has cheated me by changing my wages ten times.However, God has not allowed him to harm me. If he said, ‘The speckled ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks gave birth to speckled young; and if he said, ‘The streaked ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks bore streaked young. So God has taken away your father’s livestock and has given them to me. In breeding season I once had a dream in which I looked up and saw that the male goats mating with the flock were streaked, speckled or spotted.” (Genesis 31:4-10)

For probably the first time ever, Leah and Rachel agree on something: to go with Jacob to do whatever the Lord has instructed him to do, which is leave Paddan Adam to go to his father Isaac in the land of Canaan. But, before they leave Rachel steals the Teraphim, the household idols belonging to Laban. Why did she steal them?

There are many potential reasons why Rachel did this.

· Perhaps she worshipped these idols and did not want to be without them.

· Perhaps she did not want her father to inquire of them, to use them as tools of divination to catch them (as he may have previously done, as in Genesis 30:27).

· Perhaps it was because such idols were often used as deeds to property and she thought that by taking the idols she took whatever inheritance might be left to Laban’s children.

· Perhaps Rachel stole the teraphim simply to get back at her father, whom she felt had mistreated her, her husband, and her whole family.

· According to some Jewish traditions, Rachel took the teraphim because she wanted to keep her father Laban from idolatry. (Enduring Word Commentary)

We see that Jacob sneaks out towards the hill country of Gilead (about 300 miles away) without letting Laban know. But, when Laban finds out he pursues him, and on the way the Lord warns him in a dream “not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad” (Gen 31:24). God continues to protect Jacob from harm.

When Laban arrives, he confronts Jacob and questions him as to why he left and deceived him. Jacob answers that he was afraid he’d take his wives from him by force. Laban then reveals that the Lord warned him not to say anything good or bad to Jacob, and even if he wanted to harm him, he couldn’t. This shows us his intentions were bad from the beginning of the pursuit.

Laban accuses Jacob of stealing his idols, but Jacob did not know Rachel had taken them and therefore cursed whoever did with death: “But if you find anyone who has your gods, that person shall not live” (Gen 31:32). Rachel sat on the idols as Laban searched the tents and made the excuse that she was on her menstrual period and therefore could not stand up. We must note that Laban really cared for his idols, and even after seeing how the true God blessed Jacob he still chose to believe in divinations and in his idols, which, if we see, couldn’t even protect themselves from being stolen. There is no power in idols.

Before he leaves, we see Jacob tell Laban how he has been wronged by him. For twenty years he worked for him, taken care of his animals, bore the loss of any from his own flock, worked day and night, and Laban still changed his wages 10 times. But, thankfully God continued to bless Jacob anyway. We see Jacob’s integrity through what he had to endure and his honor in it as well. He truly worked for Laban as if he worked for the Lord (Colossians 3:23).

This is how we should work for our employers. We may be working for a boss that is negative, that doesn’t treat us well, that undermines or undercuts us at work, but we know that the Lord calls us to serve them as if we worked for the Lord directly, because we do. We would be smart to follow Jacob’s example.

We finish chapter 31 with Laban and Jacob entering into a covenant together, with witnesses surrounding them, swearing that they would never pass the heap of stones to hurt each other, and as God as their witness. Laban called the place Jegar Sahadutha, which is Aramaic for witness heap and Jacob called it Galeed, which is the Hebrew translation. This is the last time we hear of Laban, which is good because as a child of God, Jacob would need to separate himself from those that enjoy living in the world and who worship idols. We, as well, should try to walk a life worthy of our calling, separating ourselves from those that may pull us away from what God has called us to do and who tempt us to follow the ways of the flesh (1 Cor 5:11).

We move on to chapter 32 where the angels of God meet with Jacob. We don’t know whether this was a vision by day or dream by night as he had before when he dreamt of the ladder to heaven (Gen 28:12) but we see that they have appeared to him as if they were welcoming him back to Canaan.

“Those that keep in a good way have always a good guard; angels themselves are ministering spirits for their safety, Hebrews 1:14. Where Jacob pitched his ents, they pitched theirs about him, Psalms 34:7.” (Matthew Henry Commentary)

Jacob named the place Manahaim, which means two hosts or two camps. Some say because the host of angels that were with him in Mesopotamia delivered him to the angels in the land of Canaan, who met him on the borders, or because he saw two hosts of angels, one at ether side of him, or in front and behind to protect him, or because there were two camps, his own camp and the camp of angels there as well.

In Genesis 32:3-8 we see that Jacob is distressed because he will see his brother Esau again and the last time he saw Esau, he wanted to kill Jacob for stealing his birthright and his blessing (Gen 27:41).

“He sends a very kind and humble message to Esau. It does not appear that his way lay through Esau’s country, or that he needed to ask his leave for a passage; but his way lay near it, and he would not go by him without paying him the respect due to a brother, a twin brother, an only borother, an elder brother, a brother offended. Note… Though our relations fail in their duty to us, yet we must make conscience of doing our duty to them.” (Matthew Henry Commentary).

In Genesis 32: 9-12 we see that in times of Jacob’s trouble and distress, He calls on the Lord. Even though he knows there are angels surrounding him, he knows that the one true God is the one that can save him. The angels themselves are fellow servants “with you and with your fellow prophets and with all who keep the words of this scroll” (Rev 22:9). Jacob runs to our strong tower (Proverbs 18:10) because with God we have liberty of speech (parrhēsía) at the throne of grace. We can come to Him with anything.

Jacob calls the Lord, “God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac.” With that same prayer, we can call out to God in times of distress, for we have been brought into the Lord’s royal family (1 Peter 2:9). Therefore we can cry out to The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, “In you our ancestors put their trust; they trusted and you delivered them,” (Psalms 22:4) so You, Lord, can deliver us too.

Jacob asks the Lord to remember His promise to prosper him and make his descendants like the sand of the sea. We too can stand strong in God’s promises and we can say to God in prayer what He has said to us, Lord you said this and this; “Remember your word to your servant, for you have given me hope” (Psalms 119:49).

Jacob sends off several caravans of gifts for his brother from his own flock of animals as gifts, along with a humble message, to hopefully pacify his anger before he finally sees Jacob. That night when Jacob was alone we see that he wrestled with an angel til daybreak. Hosea 12:4 tells us that Jacob “struggled with the angel and overcome him; he wept and begged for his favor.” His supplication, prayers, and his tears were his weapons. It was not just a physical wrestling, but a spiritual one. Hence, when we pray, we also wrestle with God.

Gen 32:28 says that the angel said to Jacob, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.” How did he prevail? Not by his own strength, because the angel would have crushed him, but by the strength of the Lord.

“We cannot prevail with God, but in his own strength. It is his Spirit that interviews in us, and helps our infirmities (Romans 8:26).” (Matthew Henry Commentary)

Who was the angel? It was Jesus in the Old Testament before His incarnation in Bethlehem. This was God in human form.

“I suppose our Lord Jesus Christ did here, as on many other occasions preparatory to his full incarnation, assume a human form, and came thus to wrestle with the patriarch.” (Spurgeon)

“Some think the was a created angel, the angel of his presence (Isaiah 63:9), one of those that always behold the face of our father and attend on the shechinah [the presence of God in the world as conceived in Jewish theology], or the divine majesty, which probably Jacob had also in view. Others think it was Michael our prince, the eternal Word, the angel of the covenant, who is indeed the Lord of the angels, who often appeared in a human shape before he assumed the human nature for a perpetuity; whichsoever it was, we are sure God’s name was in him, Exodus 23:21.” (Matthew Henry Commentary)

As we finish the chapter let us note that Jacob is now named Israel. Israel means wrestles with God. And, he did not wrestle all night for nothing. The angel blessed him and when he was gone Jacob, now Israel, named the place Peniel, which means face of God, because he says, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared” (Gen 32:30). Therefore we can assume that the angel was The Angel of the Lord, the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ.

We finish today’s reading with chapter 33, where Jacob meets with his older brother Esau. Jacob comes forward to Esau, leading his family from the front, bowing down to the ground seven times to Esau as he advances, and has spaced his family out behind him, the servants and their children first, Leah and her children, and Rachel and Joseph in the back.

“We see a humble submissive carriage goes a great way towards the turning away of wrath. Many preserve themselves by humbling themselves: the bullet flies over him that stoops.” (Matthew Henry Commentary).

In this picture of reunited siblings we see how God can not only restore relationships but how he can change the hearts of our enemies from that of stone to one of flesh (Ezekiel 11:19).

“He can all of a sudden convert enemies into friends, as he did two Souls, one by restraining grace (1 Samuel 26:21,25), the other by renewing grace (Acts 9:21-22). It is not in vain to trust in God, and to call upon him in the day of trouble, those that do so often find the issue much better than they expected… They both wept. Jacob wept for joy, to be thus kindly received by his brother whom he had feared; and Esau perhaps wept for grief and shame, to think of th ebad design he had conceived against his brother, which he found himself strangely and unaccountably prevented from executing.” (Matthew Henry Commentary)

We find that even though Jacob received the birthright and the blessing, Esau was blessed as well. When Jacob tries to gift him all the animals in the caravans that he sent forth before him, Esau said, “I already have plenty, my brother” (Gen 33:9). He only ends up keeping it because of Jacob’s continued insistence. Esau leaves with the premise that one day he will go to visit Esau in Seir.

Jacob arrives at Shechem, bought a plot of ground and pitched his tent. He sets up an altar and calls it El Elohe Israel, meaning God, the God of Israel, to honor the LORD, the one true God.

Tomorrow we move on to chapters 34-36 in Genesis, and we finish the book of Genesis this week! How exciting to have almost two full books of the Bible down in what will be less than a month. I hope you’re learning a lot and enjoying it all at the same time. I know I am! Make sure to follow RF on Instagram, and join our FB Group to stay up to date for our upcoming weekly zoom sessions!